Triathlon - What Kind of Triathlon One Year from Starting at Zero?

I ride my bicycles a lot and run a little, now my wife is getting the bug.

She's essentially starting from scratch on everything, wants to do a triathlon next year.

I realize this is a horribly unanswerable question, but what would a good goal be? What kind of tri event would you shoot for if it was you?

Read up on doing a tri and then find a sprint tri somewhere close by and train for that. Some of it will depend on her strengths. If she's coming from a swimming background, she can do a sprint with an 800meter swim option. If she's not a swimmer, maybe a 200meter option. And, you can look at the other two legs the same way. Once the bug is in full effect, she can find a group to train with to do a longer sprint or an olympic. Good luck!

She swam in college for fitness, did reasonably well with it. That was 15 years ago.

She has been wanting to do triathlon for several years, then wanted to get on the bike as a commuter/errand rig. Almost the next day she was wanting running shoes and now has discovered this is within reach.

Any length tri can be your first, it just depends how hard you want to train. Obviously, starting from scratch and wanting to win an IM length race is probably a pipe dream. But it is possible to start from scratch and within a year get to the point where a person could finish an IM length race inside the cutoff time.

Most people start with sprints as it's a good introduction to the sport. You can go from the couch to being able to finish a sprint within three months. Again, a person won't be winning a sprint with only three months training.

I'd say, have her find a sprint triathlon about 3-4 months away and start training for that. Once she completes her first and has a taste for the sport, she can decide if she wants to keep training for a longer event (i.e. Olympic) in another 3-4 months, and keep progressing from race to race. Or maybe after doing her first race she discovers that it's not for her. Also, some people are satisfied with just staying at the sprint level.

I agree. No reason to wait a full year. In June '04 I was about 50 lbs overweight and couldn't walk up a single flight of stairs without becoming winded. Six weeks later I finished a sprint (0.5 mi swim, 12 mi bike, 3 mi run). About six months after that, I did an Olympic. The following year, I did my first Half IM.

Depending on the time she has to train and how far she really wants to race, I think she should sign up for a sprint in the summer/fall and perhaps chose a Half IM (70.3) for her year goal.

I did a super-sprint with a 200m swim (which almost killed me, I can barely dog paddle), a 7 mile bike, and a one mile run. I felt like I had accomplished something great. It took about 45 min, and I left with a giant grin on my face.